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A quick theory on Shadowcrystals

We're told that the Shadow Crystals grant some sort of power:

But we never quite get a good idea of what combat advantage, if any, the crystals offer.

But I actually think we do. I propose that the Shadow Crystals are what allow you to do a "Neo Attack", or more commonly referred to as a fullscreen attack. Y'know, Jevil's True and Neo Chaos, Spamton's Power of Neo, and the Knight's Roaring attack.

This would explain why Gerson does not have a fullscreen attack- he doesn't use his crystal, he says so himself:

And this also potentially explains why the Knight drops a shadowcrystal on defeat, despite presumably not wanting to give it to us. They drop it because they were just using it, since they had just called upon its power to use a neo attack.

The narration warning you about the fullscreen attack draws special attention to the Knight's hands. Why? Because their Shadowcrystal is in their hand and they're channeling its power. It's no wonder that they dropped it after Susie clashed with them- it must've still been in their grasp!

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Mike is short for Micycle

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Rare Toby Fox tumblr sighting

is art i draw am excited for everyone to play deltarune!!

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Here is a revised version of one of my earlier diagrams, explaining how I currently perceive at least part of DELTARUNE's Story.

I used to believe in Take 2 theory- the idea that Gaster is trying to divert the course of history, and make a New Future as he puts it himself. I still do! However, I believe now that the Weird Route, a deviation from a deviation, is actually going "back" towards the original take 1 prophecy. We take importance and we put it on Noelle. For a bit more on why putting importance on Noelle might be more like the original prophecy, see my post on Susie.

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The first two parts of my DELTARUNE Chapters 3-4 playthrough are now live. I'm a diehard Deltarune Theorist who's been actively analyzing this game for the past 4 years, so I hope my perspective is at least a little interesting...!

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The Significance of Susie, Rude Buster, and The Prophecy.

(This has spoilers for 3-4)

This is a bit of a long post, but it's an important one, I think. Let's talk about Susie's signature spell, Rude Buster. I genuinely think there is thematic significance to this spell. To get to why, though, I want to go over everything.

Rude Buster is a spell that Susie knows from the moment we meet her in Chapter 1. It costs 50% TP, and, as the description tells us, it inflicts moderate "rude" element damage to one foe, and uses both Attack and Magic in its calculation. It considers defense in its calculation, and it scales better with Attack than it does Magic.

I want to compare this spell to another spell, Iceshock.

Iceshock inflicts "magical ICE damage" to one enemy, and costs 16% TP. It scales purely with the Magic stat, and is unaffected by her Attack stat. It also cuts through defense. On the surface, Iceshock is generally the better spell, it would seem. It might not deal as much damage at first, but it's significantly cheaper than Rude Buster, ignores defense, and scales like crazy when Noelle becomes Stronger.

While this is speculative, it almost comes off as if Iceshock is being more 'properly' cast. It's described as 'magical', it seemingly instantly surrounds an enemy rather than needing to be aimed, it ignores defense entirely. But... I think there's a bit more to it than that. Noelle's magic is kind of distinct from Noelle herself in a way. There's some level of detachment. There's distance. This is (partially) why we're able to manipulate her so easily into getting stronger. It's easy to not think about it. They're just enemies. Etc. But Rude Buster? It's a direct extension of Susie herself. She might not be directly naturally talented with Magic, but hell if that'll stop her. She channels everything she has into her axe and sends it out as a bolt of rude energy.

My point is this.

Iceshock deals perfect, magical damage to an enemy, piercing defense. It's better than a Susie crit at first, and it scales drastically. It's simple, and it's cost efficient.

Rude Buster is a direct extension of Susie herself. It's her raw emotion channeled into a single attack. It's her willpower, her resolve, her hope, all imbued into one little spell. Rude Buster as a spell is, either symbolically or literally, Susie's resolve.

This is why it is a "Rude" buster. What does it mean to be Rude? To be impolite. To not follow the rules, the expectations. And, if there's one thing Susie excels at, it's breaking every single expectation anyone might have for her. Is it truly by chance that, out of everyone in the party, it is Susie who talks back to the Roaring Knight? Is it truly by chance that the only party member who can actually do anything of substance against The Knight is Susie, with Rude Buster? Kris is (in most circumstances) holding back. Susie and Ralsei are able to deal chip damage. But Rude Buster, through sheer force alone, overcomes the Knight's defense, not by being magic or anything like that, but simply because it's that good.

Consider also The Titan. Everything seems bleak, the Titan can regenerate, and there's nothing we can do. So what do we do? We call upon Rude Buster. Technically it's "Dual Buster", but...

Susie and Gerson are both clearly casting variations of Rude Buster here.

And it works. And, lets think on that for a moment. Gerson also knows a version of Rude Buster. ...Why?

It's not like Gerson doesn't have his own magical attacks he could have used here, right? They could've easily done something else for this. But... No. Gerson casts his own Rude Buster. Why? Well, think about what Gerson stands for. He believes, in the same way Susie does, that the Prophecy isn't all it's cracked up to be. He believes that it can blind you, that it's better to read between the lines. As a Secret Boss, his philosophy is "I don't care".

So, to me, at least, it makes perfect sense that he would also know Rude Buster. Because, just like Susie, when confronted with the fate of the universe in bold text, he simply laughs it off.

This is also, I believe, why Gerson is the only character who can outright reflect Rude Buster.

Because while Gerson might not have the same resolve to change fate as Susie does, he is driven in a similar way.

The Devilsknife reduces Rude Buster's TP Cost. Why? Is it just because logically a jevil-turned-scythe would be good at channeling Magic? No. Think about what Jevil stands for. He believes that because his choices do not matter, he is free of consequence. He can "do anything", because his choices are irrelevant. If he could somehow be punished, then, well, his choices would've mattered, then, wouldn't they? And he knows that's not true. So he does whatever he damn well pleases. Obviously, Jevil and Susie are not really comparable- Jevil fully accepts that Fate is unbreakable, and Susie very much seems to think The Prophecy is bogus by the end of Chapter 4.

But, I think the throughline is there. Devilsknife makes Rude Buster easier to cast, because by nature, Jevil is already used to doing whatever he wants and ignoring the 'rules'. I hope I've made my case clear. But there's even more.

This may well be where I lose you, to be clear, so I hope you take everything I've said about Rude Buster as its own thing, and consider the rest of what I have to say as an extension of that. If you don't believe what I'm about to say, that's totally fine. Without further ado... Let us consider... The Prophecy.

The Second Hero of the Prophecy is "The Girl, with Hope crossed on her heart." As many before me have pointed out, this depiction... does not quite look like Susie. The weapon is wrong. This is a much longer discussion and I don't think I can quite fit it into this post, but, in essence, I believe that this was supposed to be Noelle Holiday. Noelle actually can equip a few swords as of Chapters 3-4, surprisingly. She can equip the Jingleblade and the Blackshard. However, I don't believe that Susie is "not" the second hero. I believe that The Prophecy has been tampered with. Or, at least, reinterpretted. Think back to what Gerson said. Stories can be changed. They can be retold.

Cat Petterz the RPG is a ripoff of Dragon Blazers, which is a retelling of Lord of the Hammer, which is a retelling of The Prophecy, which is a retelling of DELTARUNE.

I believe that this sort of thing is happening to the prophecy itself. I believe that Gaster, for one reason or another, changed the prophecy, replacing "The Second Hero, The Girl" with Susie. This sort of rules lawyering is possible because Susie is also referred to later in the prophecy:

We know that this is Susie because Rude Buster is being used to identify her. This image is even called "Rude Buster" internally. I believe the original prophecy was introducing Susie as a different "The Girl". However, because it technically uses the same term to refer both to Noelle and Susie, their roles can be altered. And so, Susie, through Gaster's intervention, became the Second Hero.

But why? Why was it important to make Susie involved? I believe it's simply because of who Susie is. When confronted with fate, Susie laughs it off. She won't let it happen. Wheras someone like Noelle would try and accept it for what it is, most likely, Susie outright refuses to play by the rules. And this gets us back into Rude Buster. Rude Buster is important. It's important enough to be the name of the battle theme, it's important enough to be what symbolizes Susie most directly in the prophecy. I believe that Rude Buster, and what it represents, is why Gaster chose Susie. Noelle might, in some sense, have "hope crossed on her heart". But it'd be passive hope. Wistful hope. Susie has active hope. With every fiber of her being, she has that hope. She inspires that hope in others. It is, as Ralsei puts it, infectious. She infects herself with hope, and grows it.

She infects Ralsei with hope.

She gives Tenna hope.

And, though this is more of a stretch, she even, indirectly, infects Seam with hope.

Remember that the only reason we could even potentially defeat The Knight is through Susie's perseverance, and Susie has to defeat Gerson, (who Seam is talking about here) on her own. Remember what Gerson told us.

Susie has the White Pen, that can draw over the dark pages of fate, known as Hope.

I believe that Gaster picked up his own pen, to transform Deltarune into his deltarune, one where Susie steps up to bat as the second hero of prophecy...

...So that Susie could, in turn, pick up her own white pen, and write a new ending. Chapter 7. A retelling of a retelling. The words on the wall called her a hero. Maybe that's not what they were ""supposed"" to mean. But, does it even matter? Through her grit and determination, it won't make a difference. She may not have been intended to be the second hero, but, she is, angel damnit, and the universe is just going to have to accept it. She may not have been chosen by The Angel, or whatever the hell wrote that prophecy, but she was chosen by one Wing Gaster, who considers her Very, Very Wonderful. She wields the White Pen to draw all over fate. And, of course, that white pen has a name. "Rude Buster". When the hands of fate draw near, you can always count on a good ol' Susie Rude Buster to persevere through anything.

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You know, despite the common sentiment with how the new chapters will affect all the takes and AUs being “Oh, now that we have the official chapters we don’t need them anymore” (despite such an approach being super mean), Deltarune itself I feel still pays tribute to these alternative interpretations of itself and understands their importance to fans.

This will be delving into spoilers for 3-4 so this is your warning.

So, in chapter 4 Gerson talks about how his book series, Lord of the Hammer, was based on the actual Prophecy.

And, generally, the events in the book aligns mostly with the story beats in the game thus far. There’s some key differences, of course, but generally the same.

Then, after the fight, Susie notes that Dragon Blazers, the video game series that has been mentioned many time across these chapters, is in fact based on Lord of the Hammer.

Then, Gerson says something that I feel holds a lot of weight for both what the story could be leading to but also the effect Deltarune itself has had on its fans.

To not be afraid to remix, to make additions and changes where they didn’t previously exist. So even if all of the AUs that were made before ch.3-4 or even ch.2 weren’t “accurate”, they have already become something new and I think that’s special.

So, be sure to also appreciate your favorite fanwork of Deltarune when you get the chance.

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So this really just meant nothing and it's just wrong in DELTARUNE for no reason. Rare Toby L. This was one of my favorite details in UNDERTALE...

Something weird in DELTARUNE that I've always found strange... SOUL Modes in deltarune work differently than they did in UNDERTALE. In UNDERTALE, the enemy would cast the SOUL mode onto you, and it would persist until the end of the fight, or until the monster turned it off.

However, in DELTARUNE, this is not the case.

The SOUL is Red in the menus! And, I don't think this is a weird mistake. The SOUL animation at the start and end of the turn is also red!

What I believe the implication is, is that it's not that Spamton turned our SOUL Yellow on accident or something- The SOUL is, consistently, exiting Kris' body, changing into the yellow SOUL mode to dodge the attack, and then un-changing back into the red SOUL to return to Kris. I think the idea is that the SOUL Modes in deltarune are more, like, instinctual responses the SOUL taps into. The SOUL exits the body to dodge, instinctively can tell that it can't dodge this attack, and so changes forms to better combat the opponent. A very interesting implication. Could even have thematic importance..? (...Maybe these powers are powers only the player can cause to surface, thus letting the player protect Kris from a danger they otherwise wouldn't be able to avoid? I wonder how they might feel about that, only surviving because of our presence...)

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REJOICE!

THE NEXT PATCH TO DELTARUNE MAY ADRESS NON-FATAL BUGS!! THIS MIGHT FIX FRAUDCHEF!!

SPINCAKE FOR LIFE!!!

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NEW POSTING

Hello. I am infuriated beyond words. Beyond comprehension, even. You see, in DELTARUNE, If you return the Topcake to the Topchef, he will give you a Spincake, promising that "every day", "forever", he will give you one. Additionally, he promises that the Spincake will get stronger each day. Both of these are lies. The Spincake does not get stronger, and he refuses to give you one in Chapter 4.

This is unforgivable. Is it a bug? Is it a feature? I do not know. All I know is that Topchef is a scam artist, a conman, and I will not allow him to escape unscathed. In this light, I shall begin TOPCHEFPOSTING until further notice. The Agenda begins now..!

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This thing

As the years go by

I will never die

The agenda never dies. It simply evolves.

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This aged like fine wine. Flower King is so real.

Here is a diagram conveying why I believe Flower King will be a Dark World in the future.

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I mean. We kind of won? I dunno.

Crazy stupid DELTARUNE Idea: What if the Chapter 3 Secret Boss is, like, in a darker-than-dark world or something. And like as you go deeper down, the game's graphics and quality get more abstract and reduced (think like FNAF World's flipside) And so by the time you reach the Secret Boss, things are so low-tech and abstract that the battle system is, like, barely functional, and that's why they're so unbeatable without the shadow mantle? Basic functions of the combat system no longer work, the very concept of TP nothing more but a distant memory.

Against an opponent so powerful, in conditions like that, victory may well be impossible. Unless, of course, you could somehow bring a bit of the power of the world above down with you..? I don't actually believe this but it's a fun idea so I made a mock-up of how that might look. Enjoy.

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DELTARUNE TOMORROW